


ask your heart (what it knows)

by oblivioluna



Category: Purple Hyacinth - Ephemerys & Sophism (Webcomic)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Historical, F/M, Spies and Secret Agents oh my, THIS AU IS SO SOFT YOU GUYS, a gathering of like 100 romance tropes, cold war au, i wanted to write lula for once, i’m not a one trick pony see!, so much oladyi, there’s lauki and kywi in this but it’s minor
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-10
Updated: 2021-01-18
Packaged: 2021-03-13 22:01:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 14,989
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28660668
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/oblivioluna/pseuds/oblivioluna
Summary: “You shouldn’t be asking me these things.”“I’m asking them anyway,” Lila says softly, caramel hair drifting in the wind. In cashmere and wool, she looks the portrait of benevolence as she always does; and frankly, always is. But there is more, if one dares to look - beyond the rose-tinted glitter of her eyeshadow, the fog crystallizing on her spectacles, the bridge of her straight nose, the look in her eyes. The look in her eyes Lukas is more familiar with than he’d like to be.No one thinks I can be anything other than what I look like.“Go ahead and ask them,” he says gruffly, voice low and heady like the scratch of a gold tipped needle about to play a melody on some forlorn phonograph. “It’s your job anyhow, solnyshka.”//(1954. The Cold War continues on, and Lila Desroses, an American spy, has been given a mission: to track down and extract one former mafia member and current KGB agent Lukas Randall.)
Relationships: Lila Desroses/Lukas "Grumpy Cat" Randall
Comments: 41
Kudos: 47





	1. the firebird and the princess

**then**

He doesn’t remember much of his past, but this is one thing he remembers:

He was loved.

He knows that much.

He doesn’t remember that much, either, but he does remember one thing. It’s not because tragedy decided to wipe the board clean of his parents, either, like they so often do in the movies, those grand old black-and-white and occasionally technicolor things they splay across the board, the entire array of human emotion available for consumption. He’s never liked the pictures. 

But he did like Mama, and her stories. She would always tell him a wide variety of them, on their way to their vacationing dacha down in Uglich, the old 46’ Tucker Convertible chugging down the dirt road as it attempted to go like the little car that could. And indeed it could, because they made the journey safely every year, and every year, the routine would be the same. The lights would go on. His parents would dance to Klavdiya Shulzhenko and Trio Lescano when they thought no one was watching. Papa would sneak extra jam into his already-sugary tea, and they’d go down to the beach sometimes, splashing in the salty waves.

But what he remembers the most is the stories he was told. His favorite, for some reason, and he can’t remember who told him this - was the tale of snegurochka herself, the winter queen. Sometimes the daughter of Father Frost, but always the same wintry girl inside, all cold and brash and timeless, ageless, unyielding. Her story is never constant - like a breeze, then a blizzard. Lukas remembers that in one variation, she fell for a gaggle of mortals and melted to nothing but water.

Maybe that’s why he remembers his snegurochka now, because she is too similar to him nearly a decade and a half later. They are the same, he and the midwinter, and midwinter and he. He’s no broken boy, no amnesiac, regretful man, no haunted beast. 

Lukas Randall has always been afraid, and that is so like the Moscow winters that parade a war around the world now. And when his hands go for a gun, craving violence, whether it be for the bratva themselves or for the agency, it is the same, two countries going for a weapon because they fear, they fear, they fear.

He does not remember much, but he remembers that he does not wish to melt.

____

**now**

The day Lauren Sinclair finally gets a date is the same day Lila Desroses nearly loses it.

It’s an odd thing to see the CIA’s most bloodthirsty and chaotic workaholic get a boyfriend and start running off into the distance with the most romantic and unabashedly poetic-waxing  _ artist  _ of all people. There’s a cake involved. Kym brings party whistles. Will doesn’t throw a tantrum for once over the mess.

One uses charcoal and paintbrushes to express their feelings. The other uses a gun and occasionally very pointy knives. It shouldn’t work. It does anyway.

Opposites attract, she supposes, as she walks down the too-long hallway down to Hermann’s workplace. She doesn't get a chance to even touch the handle to her superior’s office because a hand yanks the back of her collar and tugs at her hard, careening her straight into Kym’s path. The agent just smiles her way, a toothy grin, and shoves a glass of whiskey into her hands.

“Lila!” she erupts, hiccuping a bit. “Come on, join the fun! Can’t you see the impossible’s been done?”

“Thank you for the - uh,  _ offer,”  _ she says, straightening her spectacles as she looks down at the amber liquid in a plastic cup, slightly dented in her hands. None of it has gotten on her outfit, thankfully, which was selected to look a bit fancier today: a plaid swing skirt below her knees, and a collared white shirt with pink trim at the end. She’d gotten the blouse half off at Jane Norman’s down at Saks. And it had been hell driving down there, too. New York winters are a different breed in and out of themselves. “I do have an appointment with Hermann now, though, so if you’ll excuse me--” Her best smile goes on, a relic from her secretary days, “--I should really--”

_ “Nope,”  _ Kym retorts, slinging an arm around her shoulders, drawing a yelp out of her.  _ “You  _ deserve a break.  _ HEY, PEOPLE!” _

Lila plugs her ears as a crowd of nearby field agents around Lauren’s desk - the aforementioned woman looking like she wants to die - shout in response, popping party whistles and whooping. Will is on the verge of a migraine, and it’s a shame she couldn’t have gone over to her own desk for some Advil.

“Tell me,” she slurs, gripping onto Lila’s hand and dragging her over to Lauren’s station. When she does, she shoves Lila into a chair, and Kym raises her own glass in the air. “What - my comrades in arms - is today?”

“The day Lauren Sinclair got a boyfriend,” they chorus, loud and clear.

“And what, my fellow Americans, does that  _ mean?” _

_ “New national holiday!”  _ they scream back, Kym being the loudest.

“Bigger than Columbus Day,” she adds. “Bigger than uh - Christmas. Cheers.”

And the Midwesterner downs another whisky as the crowd goes wild. Lila gives a sympathetic smile - maybe grimace - to Lauren, as the redhead crawls under her desk in fetal position. It doesn’t do much.

“Bigger than the day we defeat the Kremlin?!” Will demands, close to popping a vein. “Kym - for goodness’ sake, get  _ off the table -  _ Lauren, don’t hide like that, you’ll hurt your head,” he says, practically dragging his childhood friend out from under her desk. “Look, everyone, can we just not trash the place? Hermann’s going to hear us if we continue like this -  _ Kym, do not touch the cake with your bare hands--” _

“I think I’ll leave,” she says to no one in particular. No one has heard her, after all, over the commotion, and it’s all too easy to slip away into the open and dash straight for her superior’s office.

____

  
  


Director Hermann hasn’t spoken for an entire minute. Neither has Oliver March, his subordinate and executive director. The clock ticking in the back of the office is eerily loud in the silence, and Lila’s about to start coughing; the lemon potpourri that someone has left out is extremely bitter.

Finally, he does speak, and when he does, throws open a file on his already-cluttered desk. 

“Our Moscow agent was compromised,” he says. “By MI6 double agents. Or rather, one in particular.”

Lila glances down at the file in horror.  _ Harvey Wood, 26 years of age,  _ it reads. “That’s awful,” she says, genuinely saddened by the weight of her grief. She’d known Wood back in her secretary days, and he always spared a kind word for everyone around him. “Was he killed?”

“Yes. Because he was working for  _ them,”  _ Hermann says bitterly, and Lila’s eyes snap wide open. “The British agent realized this, and took him out. Thankfully, the US still has good relations with them. Otherwise, the actions she made would stress an already tight bond. We don’t have many allies in this fight, Miss Desroses.”

“I see,” she says slowly. A revelation comes over her, even as he and March speak little, and look at each other little. For the civilians on the streets of either America or Russia, she knows how they view war: a competition. Not some immature, useless, free-for-all weapons contest: a fight to the death to see who is the best in the world. Some seemingly-galiant meaning in threatening mutually assured destruction. For her, she is angry at it, although no one would ever think someone like  _ her  _ angry. But she is. She’s always been angry at a war that has taken millions of lives. The grief and suffering World War II inflicted on billions still resides on her shoulders to this day, although she had no losses, no part in it, thank goodness.

_ You feel too much, dear,  _ a receptionist had once told her.  _ It’s a wonder you’re an agent. _

“Why am I here?” she asks politely, despite knowing anyways. 

“We need an agent suitable for the job. As all our information gatherers are overseas at the moment, and Sinclair is stationed on break, Hermann and I both think you fit Wood’s profile just fine,” March says, throwing her a wan smile. 

She swallows, hard. “Thank you, sirs. But Ladell and Hawkes—”

“Hawkes has been stationed in D.C for next month, and Ladell specializes in combat and...special expertises,” March says, wincing. “And Sinclair is...Sinclair.”

“She nearly compromised the CIA by taking out thirteen men while she was supposed to be acting hapless,” Hermann snaps. 

“Her friends were in danger,” Lila retorts lightly. “And Kym is one of the kindest people I know. They all are trained as well as I have been. I apologize,” she says rapidly, her words coming out in a rush, “but I have only been given small assignments over the two years I have acted as an active agent. I have not done infiltration work, nor gone abroad. I do not think such a case would suit me.”

Hermann’s mouth thins, but he doesn’t yell at her like she thought he would. “You have not. And admittedly, you have been handling rather...menial cases.”

“I wouldn’t object to more experience. I’ve been trained.”

“You have,” March agrees, “which is why we think this case would suit you well, despite your experience in the actual field.”

She looks down, fiddling with her skirt.

_ Too soft.  _

_ She’s so sweet, she wouldn’t harm a fly— _

_ Look at her, all pretty and delicate like roses; suits her— _

“I’ll take it, then,” she says, a little too eagerly. If they notice her such change of mood, they don’t say anything. “What’s the assignment?”

“While you will be sent to Moscow for two weeks as an undercover journalist,” Hermann says, sliding another file her way, “you will also be expected to gather information on a Soviet information leaker of ours. He’s expected to defect soon. KGB agent,” he adds, “and former Bratva member.”

She sucks in a breath as she sees the profile in front of her for the first time. 

About five foot eleven - seven inches taller than she is - with a fearsome brow and dark eyes. 

“Over the Atlantic and delivered here, safe and sound,” he says. “Good luck, Agent Desroses.”

____

Two days later, she hails a taxi to LaGuardia down in Queens. The airport is relatively new - it was constructed back in 1939, and yet, nearly 15 years later, it’s as if the place has been open for a hundred years and abandoned in a flash. Getting through security is hell. Going through checkpoints is hell. Waiting, which happens to occur in Gate E59 between a trash compactor and a stuffy, stinky excuse for a burger chain, is hell. But her flight arrives at last, an hour after she arrives, and Lila boards it all too eagerly.

Under a guise, of course, and equipped with more infiltration equipment than she’s ever carried in her life. She is still Lila Desroses on the outside, but the passport she hands over to security reads Amelie Thoreaux. Age twenty-seven - a year older than she actually is - and born and raised in Seattle, when in actuality she is a Brooklyn native through and through. Transfer student in communications, due for a journalist position in Moscow, fluent in both English and Russian.

The last three only elaborate on truths. She was a former double major in chemistry and journalism, and is technically a polyglot in five languages - self-taught, if you count her rudimentary Swedish as a fifth language.

  
“Drink, miss?” the flight attendant asks, snapping her out of her reverie. Lila sets down the paper she’s reading - inside it is a briefing on the specifications of her assignment - and closes it gently, requesting and accepting a tomato juice with a smile. The woman goes off to serve the other passengers, curled locks bouncing up and down as she strides down the walkway. Outside the plane, rain patters gently against the window, the cloudy evening sky rapidly graying as the storm continues on.

_ “Attention passengers, this is Captain Roberts speaking. You’re on Aeroflot number B60, a one-way trip from New York to Moscow. We’ve currently gone above 10,000 feet, and refreshments are now being served throughout the airline. Feel free to--” _

“Towel?” one flight attendant offers, holding out one, steam forming in the air. She accepts it with grace, holding it to her dry cheeks. At least the CIA spared her the luxury of being on first-class: the leg room she’s afforded gives her room to express her nervous ticks without being judged by other passengers. Lila cannot stop shifting in her seat.

It’s a simple job. Lauren and Kym and Will and a thousand other agents could do this with ease: extract information, get a client in and out of Moscow. She won’t even have to use brute force. She will not have to stay for long.

She can do this. 

She can do this.

____

She ends up being able to do a lot of it, minus one thing that nearly gets her caught.

It turns out that Moscow winters rival that of New York’s, even, and her winter wardrobe nearly screams  _ foreigner  _ when it really should shout  _ clueless but not helpless expatriate journalist. _

“Dorogaya, ty ser’yenzo?” one of her fellow journalists, Alexei, swears, when she comes into work one day in her usual clothing, modified only slightly to the weather - a blouse with puffy sleeves and long skirt with thick leggings underneath. She startles as she hangs up her bags, her notepad already in her hands. Her mind stings with the name he’s called her - dorogaya,  _ dearest. Darling, are you serious? _

“What?” she asks, her Russian still like a livewire on her tongue - as if she’ll be exposed any moment. Ever since she got to Moscow, she’s been like a jumpy, scared weasel, scurrying around. She has to remind herself she doesn’t have to do things for people, make their lives more comfortable like she did back at the CIA. “There’s nothing wrong with--”

“You’ll freeze in those tights, Thoreaux,” Alexei says, rolling his eyes as he picks up the phone. “You’re quite good at gathering information on your interviewees around here. Use some of that knowledge to pick a more sensible wardrobe so you don’t end up a popsicle.”

Lila resists the urge to flinch away in shame, and takes the verbal recommendation - more like a chastising given his tone - to heart.

Which is what leads to her being here, in the front of a store that reads Glavniy Universaľnyj Magazín within the Red Square of Moscow. Here, apparently, is the heart and center of all shopping centers in the city. She’d asked around, and apparently before the 20s, the place used to be titled Upper Trading Rows. Looking in, though, the chaos - particularly in the women’s section - leads her to believe it would’ve been more aptly titled  _ Upper Bargaining Rows.  _

The interior is just as intimidating as the exterior is. Her skills kick in, rusty as they may be, and she inspects the place with a methodical eye - the facade extends beyond 200 feet, and the endless floors are held up by almost Roman-like columns, with a gorgeous trapezoidal glass ceiling arching above her. It would be easy to escape through the exits on either end, but harder if she were at the east or west sides of the stores. There is security at either end as well, armed. Lila bites down on her lip as she strides past them.

Although she is not a combat agent, she still carries, by requirement, a knife on each thigh. Swiss Army, and balisong. A gun in a hidden holster, obscured by her belt. She knows how to fight. She doesn’t like fighting. And the CIA, at first, had viewed that as weakness. Useless, for a girl with so much potential.

_ Useless. _

She clamps down on the memory as she enters one shop, mouthing a hello to the elderly woman in front. 

The first thing she needs to get above all else is a coat, and then, just maybe, she’ll handle the rest with a bit more ease. As she goes through the racks, however, she picks out items in her usual style - then pauses. Frilly blouses, swing skirts. Same thing, over and over and over again.

She might be a fake, but in Moscow, on her own, there is a chance in front of her. She doesn’t have to keep hiding behind a uniform, almost, like she does in the CIA. Her kindness is not a farce. But too often her timidity is, and people see through it, on the rare occasion. Lauren, with her eagle eyes. Kym, who tries to make a flower bloom on the regular. 

Lila hesitates for a beat of ten before snatching a skirt from the rack in front of her.

Taut around the hips, made of cotton. Pencil-shape, tight around the legs.

Different.

____

  
  


Lukas doesn’t notice them at first.

His path down Kitay-gorod is the same: it’s the path he takes after getting off the bus near his apartment. A stop at a local coffee shop for a to-go espresso, with a bit of something special added in from his personal flask, and he’s good as new. On the outside, it certainly doesn’t seem that way, given the apparently cold expression he wears day by day. His co-workers had commented on this more than once. It just made him more grumpy. 

His flat cap stays tight on his black locks ruffling in the wind, coat trailing the snowy air as he waits for the light to turn green across the street. When it does, he strides across the way, holding the fabric of his black turtleneck higher above his nose, leather gloves straining. A man walks alongside him, almost urgent in the way he steps forward. Lukas doesn’t catch onto the fact that he’s part of a group until he sees another man in the same dark uniform stride alongside him, only a few feet behind.

No doubt about it. He’s being tracked.

His hand goes to his gun, steadying on the trigger, when they suddenly pass him as if he hasn’t been seen at all. His eyes widen as he sees, instead, who they’re tracking instead.

In the distance, she is like a white chess piece, the queen, in a delicate scarf, hat, and trench. Short. Caramel wisps of hair framing her face, glasses nearly fogged-over. A journalist badge swings from her neck.

They’re targeting a civilian.

Just once -  _ once -  _ he’d love some semblance of peace. A single day where he didn’t have to undo the safety on his gun and go blazing into the fray. But it seems that the world cannot leave him be, and neither can danger.

A scowl downturns his lips as he begins to increase his pace, hand back on the handle of his gun.

____

Lila knows she is being watched, and followed.

They don’t act until ten minutes later, when she rounds the block to her temporary apartment, and that’s when she drops her groceries and runs straight for the emergency staircase in the alleyway between two buildings, heart in her throat. Her hands scrabble for the knives on her legs, but the coat is tight around her waist, and why, why did she tighten it so--

The door behind the staircase slams shut, and she barely gets to the second level when the banging starts. She’d locked the door, and can hear faint, rapid muttering in Russian.

_ The girl-- _

_ She couldn’t have gotten far, enter from the side-- _

She has been so, so foolish, messing up when it’s barely been a week, using her  _ personal  _ credit card instead of the one assigned to her, they probably tracked down the fact that she was CIA,  _ why-- _

“Calm down,” she mutters, fisting her coat as she leans against the door to the third level, reaching for her gun. “Calm down, calm down, you can do this, Lila, you can  _ do this.” _

Escape. She needs to escape, because if they find her, and she has to kill, she’ll never be the same again. There needs to be a way out of here. Her eyes dart to the fire extinguisher on her left - and next to it, a fire hose wound tightly around a hook. Beside it is an open window, the air whistling in. 

“Bingo,” she hisses, smile like a ten-watt beam taking over her face, and dashes for the hose. Lila heaves the nearby extinguisher in her hands and slams it against the glass. It shatters with ease, and she winds the hose around her upper body, the rest coiling on the floor. She hooks one end onto the original hook, and shoves open the windowpane. The back of the building hasn’t been occupied yet, and she musters all her courage as she tentatively steps outside, heels balancing on the edge of the window. Lila tests her weight on the makeshift rope - it stays - and shuts her eyes.

And leaps. 

The hose yanks around her waist, nearly stealing her breath away as she lands and rolls on snowy ground, but she’s arrived relatively unharmed. Lila frees herself of the rope, and starts running, skidding on ice--

\--and collides straight into the chest of a man in dark clothing, who looks down at her coldly.

She curses under her breath.

“Found you,” he drawls in thick Russian, sneering. “Little mousey--”

_ “Let go!”  _ she screeches, pummeling him across the face with her heel. He falls back as it strikes his face, her now-exposed foot meeting the cold ground. Lila grabs the gun at her belt as more men arrive, three surrounding her with their own. She swallows, heart furiously pounding against her chest. This is it, she realizes, tears pricking at the edges of her eyes. This is where everything changes, and she was an idiot for ever thinking she could remain the way she is in a world like this. 

Before Lila can attack, the sound of tires screeching reach her ears. 

The first man in front of her barely gets a chance to react as a yellow Volkswagen slams into him, nearly rolling him onto the ground. The other two fall as the car continues forward, barreling into them with the force of a truck. They’re not dead, but barely breathe as she inspects them.

She blinks up at the man gesturing to her to get inside, the windows of the car rolled down.

“Are you a fool?!” he yells in flawless English. Her heart nearly gives out as she recognizes the deadly eyes, the dark hair. “Get in!”

And so Lila agrees, and dashes forward towards the Volkswagen Lukas Randall drives. She barely gets a chance to steady herself when he pulls out of there rapidly, driving like a madman down the street, immune to her warning shouts.

____

“You,” she pants, after the car screeches to a halt, at long last, “you—”

Randall parks the car, shifting the joystick back, looking at her with expectant eyes. Lila doesn’t get a chance to complete her sentence as her stomach suddenly contorts inwards and she yanks open the door to promptly vomit the contents of her lunch onto the cobblestones.

When she’s done hurling her guts out, Lila straightens back up, wiping her mouth. It’s only when she looks back at him with wide eyes does he speak. 

“Lukas Randall, KGB.” He says it matter-of-factly, holding up a badge. “Why were you being chased?”

She doesn’t have any more energy for anything else other than resting her head against the seat, groaning. “I,” she starts, swallowing a bit, “made an enormous mistake.”

“How so?”

Lila runs scenarios through her head. All of them end up dead in the water:  _ I think they mistook me for someone else, I don’t know, I have business with them.  _ So she settles for a modified version of his introduction in her words, and meets his eyes - dark things, like a shark’s, predatory and unflinching. She doesn’t back away from this man, even though she should, with a sharp jaw and thick brows and a scowl that seems to be permanent. He’s beautiful, but beautiful in the way a dagger sparkles in the light before it cuts right through your skin.

“Lila Desroses,” she says, tossing her badge over her head. “CIA. I was sent to track you down.”

Lukas opens his mouth, then closes it. Opens it again. “You shouldn’t be giving information to someone you just met like that,” he says slowly, a slight accent coming out. He’s angry. Her temper rises - it isn’t fair that he is. Does he even know what she’s been through?

“You’re our information leaker,” she continues on stubbornly. “I know you’re the one providing us with sources into the government's doings. You’re not their top agent for nothing—”

“Don’t,” he exclaims, his hand centimeters away from her mouth. Lukas hisses a breath in between his teeth, the scent of coffee filling her lungs. “Are you insane? They could hear us.”

“We’re in a car,” she shoots back incredulously.

“Not mine.”

“Not  _ yours?!” _

“Did you expect me to get my own car to save you?”

“You’re a terrible driver regardless,” she snaps, and he moves back a little. If he’s expecting her to cower, he won’t be pleased. 

“It doesn’t matter,” he says gruffly. “This car could be bugged.”

Lila rolls her eyes. “It’s not. I checked while you were speeding down the road like a madman.” 

“I was  _ not—” _

“Speed limit’s 60, and you were going 80!” she exclaims, pointing to the dashboard. “You could’ve run over a grandmother!”

“I would’ve known had any babushkas passed the road,” he grumbles.

“Sure.” Lila crosses her arms. “Likely story. Where are we?”

Lukas blinks, twice, like he doesn’t know what to make of the girl in all white with a rose-tinted mouth like knives. “Near a safe house. Once the coast is clear, we’ll head in.”

She thinks carefully before she speaks next. “The CIA gave me a week before I extract you. You’ll have to come with me to New York—”

“No,” he says abruptly.

“No?” she repeats, stunned.

“No,” he says, this time more insistent. “You can tell the Americans I want no part in working for  _ their side.  _ I’m not coming with you.”

He doesn’t know it yet, but he’s pressed the first of her buttons. “Why?”

“Why?  _ Why -  _ you expect me to come with you because you’re supposedly here to save  _ me  _ and bring me overseas?” he demands. “Apologies, Agent Desroses, but I am not coming.”

“You haven’t given any reason,” she insists.

“I don’t need to.”

“I’m not going with you then,” she insists, turning up her nose as he whips his head around, gaping in awe.

“Agent,” he grits out, “please come with me. I do not wish for either of us to get killed.”

“Give me an answer,” she says. And try as she might, she can’t help smirking a bit. It’s...nice, seeing someone be surprised by what she does. What she is. The doll come alive, rouge in her cheeks and a sharp remark on her tongue. “And then I will come with you.”

He doesn’t get angry with her, but Lukas rakes a hand through his hair, sighing loudly. She’s holding him hostage at this point.

“I want no part in the CIA.” He raises a brow. “Understood?”

She nods curtly. “You won’t have to join.”

“They’ll expect me to.”

“Doesn’t matter,” she chirps, and he nearly jumps in his seat as she swings open the car door on his side, reaching across him to undo the lock. Lila looks at him, her arm stretched as it holds fast to the door. “Are you going in first, or am I?”

“Me,” he says after a while, voice strained. She catches him muttering something like  _ infuriating American  _ before taking out his gun and motioning for her to follow him.

____

As per her orders, she is expected to make contact with Hermann every two days and report on her doings. She doesn’t tell him she stumbled upon her client by means of a getaway car and a firehose instead of gaining insight into the KGB’s doings like she was supposed to be doing, but he’s pleased by her progress anyhow.

The flat is a small, two-room thing, but not small enough to be cramped, decked in shades of peeling yellow. Thankfully, she’d brought along some of her wardrobe with her, and staying the night with Lukas isn’t as awkward as she’d presumed it to be. When she wakes, however, she instantly panics at the sheer amount of daylight coming into her own room - enough to mark near noon time - and runs into the kitchen, shoving her spectacles on, screeching to a halt at the sight of Lukas bent over the stove in nothing but a shirt and trousers. He looks nothing at all like a killing machine.

“Admittedly, I don’t sleep in late, and--” Lila pauses midway through her hurried apologies. “What is that?”

“Oladyi,” Lukas explains, flipping what seems to be small, miniature pancakes on the griddle, sizzling golden brown. “Flour, butter, eggs, and currants. And the like. I would’ve made blini, but we don’t seem to have the ingredients.”

“It,” she stammers, trying to explain politely to a very sour-faced man clearly one second away from plotting another scheme that his oladyi - pancakes, whatever - are starting to burn, “uh…”

“Before I forget,” he says, cutting her off abruptly, looking away. If she didn’t know better, she’d have told herself that he realized just how much he was starting to scare her like he did his opponents. Ally, she remembers. She is his ally. “Here.” A mug of coffee lands in her hands, and she thanks him with a silent nod.

The first sip has her reeling back.

“What--” she sputters, coughing, “did you  _ put  _ in this--”

“That’s mine,” he says hastily, swapping their mugs. 

“You put alcohol in your coffee,” she croaks out, after downing half her own cup to rid the bitter taste in her mouth. She realizes the sudden comedy of the situation: a former bratva member and KGB agent with an extraordinary talent for violence, trying his best to not lumber around like a very stoic bear and cook breakfast for the both of them. The only thing that could make it all the more ridiculous would be a  _ Kiss The Cook  _ apron in frilly pink around his waist. 

_ Your cooking smells like feet and your choice of beverage terrifies me,  _ she thinks but does not say.

“I’ll order us something from the local diner,” she says, and starts creeping out of the room before Lukas can object. “Thanks, er, for attempting breakfast anyhow.”

_ Are you stupid? Do you want him to kill you? Attempt? ATTEMPT? _

“Agent--”

“Lila,” she corrects breathlessly, wiping her sweaty hands on her pajama pants. “Please call me that instead.”

“Very well,” he says. And then, slower: “Lila.”

She swallows, hard. Her name sounds different on his tongue, with that almost imperceptible accent. “I’ll be back.”

Before he can say anymore, she’s gone.

____

It turns out Lukas has a penchant for the bloodier things in life.

Literally, because after a couple of minutes talking conversationally with the diner owner downstairs, she comes back with an armful of takeout, and almost eagerly, he heads straight for the carton of borscht. It still amazes her how much the sour soup looks like fresh blood when it’s merely ground-up beets and other vegetables. They don’t make much talk over breakfast; both of them still unused to each other’s presences (and Lila is very, very uncertain of whether or not she’s making the right move by even acting  _ friendly  _ around someone who looks like the incarnation of death), but her mother had always taught her to treat guests with respect, and so, when he puts his spoon down, she stands up, gathering all her courage.

“Do you mind if I fix your car?” she asks in a rush, although to his ears it sounds like  _ doyoumindififixyourcar. _

He blinks up at her - once, twice. “What?”

“Your car,” she says, stammering. “Well. Not your car, as you clearly said. Clearly not your car. The Volkswagen which is not your car. But we need transportation, and it wasn’t exactly running smoothly yesterday, and I suspect the engine’s broken, and I don’t really want us to be driving in the snow with a broken engine, and--”

“You don’t have to do that,” he grumbles. He seems to do a lot of grumbling, she notices.

“Why not?” she demands, hands on her hips. “It’s a stolen car, sure. I’m not having us drive around with a broken engine, though.”

“There is no need for you to do that, Lila,” Lukas says, crossing his arms. “We’ll simply take public transport instead.”

“Public transport.” She frowns. “No one in Moscow takes the train. It’s freezing.”

“Agent Desroses--”

_ “Lila--” _

“Lila,” he repeats, the sliver of a sigh entering his voice. “Do you even know how to fix a car?”

“Of course I do.” She twirls car keys in her right hand. 

“You do?”

“I have training,” she replies, not letting anything else out. “Just trust me on this. I’ll bring the car into the garage so I don’t become a human popsicle, Lukas.”

“I just worry,” he says slowly, “about any danger.”

“Well, I have you, don’t I?” It comes out reflexively. His eyes widen a bit at the comment, and she backtracks, a flush creeping up on her cheeks. “And I have my own skills, that is. I’ll be fine. I’ll holler if I need you.”

“Please do not holler.”

“Sorry. I’ll whistle. Quietly.”

“Do not do that either.” Lukas hesitates. “I just...didn’t want to inconvenience you,” he says slowly. “You seemed tired.”

Lila isn’t sure why that precise comment hits deep, burrows into her chest. Maybe it’s because she’s finally met one person halfway across the world who’s actually noticed her habits, her mood, without her saying anything. It’s not that the CIA is unkind - it’s just that she’s gotten so used to blending into the background for so long that she’s forgotten how to act alone. 

“I’m fine,” she reassures him gently, inhaling deeply. “Thank you for bothering to ask, though.”

____

She isn’t sure why he follows her all the way down to the garage to watch her fix his stolen car. Perhaps it’s boredom, or sheer curiosity. Either way, when he makes his presence known - when she rolls out of the bottom of the car, her hands stained with engine grease, she finds him hovering above her squinting down at her feet - Lila shrieks, stumbling upright.

“You nearly scared the living daylights out of me!” she bursts out.  _ “Twice!” _

“Sorry.”

“Don’t say  _ sorry,  _ just move around less like a shadow,” Lila throws back, turning back to the car.  _ And stop following me around like a cat. Maybe I need to put a bell on you. Or something. _

“Your skirt.”

“Huh?” She whirls around to see where he’s gesturing - to the long pencil skirt just up to her knees, matching her peach blouse, both covered by an apron taut around her neck. “Oh. Don’t worry about that.”

“It’s going to rip. You should wear pants instead.”

“I like skirts.” Now it’s  _ her  _ turn to grumble. “And I’m almost--”

One twist of her wrist, and the wires in the top of the car engine snap together, smoke coming out in a puff. She blows it away, coughing a bit. “--there. That should do it, good as new.” 

Lila doesn’t realize she’s beaming with pride until Lukas looks away, almost in horror, and her smile fades. She coughs into her gloved palm, tugging the apron over her head. “Well, we can’t stay here forever. I have orders to follow in order to get you out of the city in a week. There’s a British contact meeting us at Manezhnaya Square this evening.”

“We’ll have to go in disguise, then.” Lukas gestures her way. “You’re an object of interest to my coworkers. Yes,  _ coworkers,”  _ he says, at her shocked expression. “I can’t be seen as a traitor or working with you.”

“Will they know we’re in Tverskoy--?”

“As long as we aren’t visibly us,” he says, deep in thought. “How good do you look in red?”

“What?”

____

The answer, apparently, is decent. A little more than decent, really - the wig of short curls down to her shoulders is a dark auburn, a bit darker than Lauren Sinclair’s. Off go the glasses into her pocket and on go contacts, and for Lukas, he merely dons a half-mask and cap, switching out his dull wardrobe for a fur coat and clothing underneath.

They are meeting the British contact of Lila’s at the Hotel Moskva, but they cannot simply enter without proper identification - or without a temporary resident of the hotel to lead them in. So both of them have to blend in with the evening crowds within Manezhnaya while they wait for her signal, the buildings all around them firelights in the snowy landscape. That’s the one thing she’s loved about Moscow ever since she’s gotten here: no matter how brutal the underbelly of it may be - matching its frigid and cold airs - it is something whisked out of a fairytale. As if someone snatched paints from a forgotten baba in the woods and dared to create myth within human eyes, color red and brown and gold and greens in swirls, high-arched domes, twirling spires, pointed pillars. Saint Basil’s Cathedral frames it all like the Eiffel does Paris, like the Empire State her own hometown, the snow tumbling down onto both of them in showers.

“She should be here in ten,” she murmurs under her breath, the fur on her coat ruffling against the shoulder of his own as she bends to whisper in Lukas’s ear. He flinches only briefly as they both stand to ‘inspect’ a stall of scarves, the market lining the walkways, and she moves back on instinct.

“Got it,” Lukas says. And doesn’t say anything further.

Lila frowns. There’s a look in his eyes she can’t place. “I’ve done research on her per my job. I may not be good in combat, but I gather intelligence for a living.”

“I still suspect she is not on the Americans’ side completely.”

“Valid, but we don’t have a choice.”

He grunts at that, like a bear who’s been told he can’t invade a honeybee’s nest. Lila barely gets a chance to inspect the rows of scarves further when he pulls her along with him into the bigger crowd mulling around the open market area, both of them passing under a streetlight. She nearly stumbles on a broken cobblestone, and only manages to stand properly when he catches her.

“Careful, milaya,” he rasps, hand right around her wrist.

She startles, and in that moment, Lila furiously wishes to have control over her body. Her mouth will not stop gaping like a fish. She can only watch as Lukas hovers a hand over her waist, and she pulls him closer in turn, the two of them under a streetlight, light and dark intertwined as one, mimicking any couple you’d see on the Moscow streets.

“Anyone?” she asks, barely breathing.

“No one so far,” he says, and she hates that his voice is steady. Is that a hitch in his breathing she hears or is it merely her imagination?

“You might have to take back your words.” Lila’s eyes concentrate on a pink-haired woman in the crowd. Even in heavy winter gear, she’s stunningly elegant and carries herself well in heavy fabrics: clad in a white fur hat and gloves, peacoat tight around the waist. Belladonna Davenport throws them a grin with dangerously rouge-covered lips, the peak of a poisonous promise, and waves with one hand towards the hotel.

Lukas spits a curse. She recognizes it, vaguely:  _ Viyebnutsa. Show off. _

“Let’s go,” she says, once he doesn’t respond to her first call, and tugs him along. Lukas follows with no shortage of reluctance, and at one point, she has to stomp her foot and tell him to put down his gun. The shadows on his face only darken at that.

Hotel Moskva is tall and wide, with a foyer as elaborate as the exterior is. Belladonna shows her card to security, waving both of them in with an easy toss of her hair and a purr. It’s Lila she beckons to her side first, shaking off show from a mountain of rose.

“Hideous, isn’t it?” she pouts, lips slightly parted as she shrugs off her hat, twirling it in her hands. “These winters.”

“London isn’t exactly warm,” Lila says, a bit too timid to say anything else.

“Well, we’re not exactly Ecuador either. I love your friend,” she trills, pointing to Lukas, who is still glowering behind her. “Bodyguard? Some dreary mob boss who you charmed with your lashes into defending you--”

“I--” She splutters. “I didn’t--”

“Lukas Randall, KGB, and if you take a single wrong step towards the American,” he growls, one hand already in his coat, face too close near hers as he storms towards Belladonna, “I will not hesitate to take out this gun and crush your bones with my bare hands.”

“My goodness,” is all she says after a while, looking towards the two of them. “A Russian?”

“A Russian,” she breathes, desperately feeling too-hot in her own skin. “Can we please not have a shootout here? I’d like to avoid violence.”

“You called this meeting, you set the terms,” she says, suddenly acting as if a switch has shut off. The agent is now cold, unyielding. “The building doesn’t allow weapons anyhow. And the security in the front is paid by the municipal police. They don’t obey the bratva quite yet. So, technically, they wouldn’t defend you if things went awry,” she says, eyeing Lukas once, twice. Her hazel eyes are methodical, needles puncturing his hide. “No tattoos that I can see...no stars, roses, unwilling ones...tell me. Was your sentence short?”

“Belladonna.” 

Lila is surprised to find the next words coming out of her own mouth. “Your report, please.”

“Right. Of course.” The woman slips her hand into her coat, acting as if she’s made an accidental misstep, but Lila knows she fully intended to catch Lukas off-guard. And it’s working: the man beside her has started shaking a bit, hands trembling. She wants to reach out and take one, quell the doom rising in the air. Belladonna emerges with a file, handing it over to her. “Eisenhower’s already worsened things on your front, for once. His so-called “massive retaliation” approach has led to Khrushchev’s increased strain on nuclear deterrence. My sources gather the Soviet fleet has started to build up their own forces in response to the USS Nautilus project. Nuclear submarines and the like.” She clicks her tongue against her cheek. “Afraid your homeland’s on the wrong side of history this time around, no matter how they paint themselves about it.”

“We’re all wrong at one point or another,” she blurts out. “And these calculations...she hasn’t breached European waters yet. This is hardly reaching past the coast of--”

“--The calculations, my dear Lila, were double-checked by my own coworkers.” Belladonna arches a brow. “Are you assuming I am deliberately misleading the CIA?”

She swallows down a retort. “No.”

Lukas hisses almost imperceptibly.

“Although you already have your suspicions, since I am, after all, Wood’s killer.”

Her hands shake on the paper, but her voice is steady. “He was a double-crosser. I don’t approve of your methods, but you did what you had to do.”

“Even if I took out three more targets on the way into the Basilica?”

Lukas is already reaching for his belt - not for his gun, but for his knife instead.

“Five, really. Your counting’s off,” she says quietly.

Lila isn’t sure how Belladonna’s grin turns sinister in the blink of an eye. “My counting’s fine, dearest. In fact, I’m counting to ten as we speak,” she says, the edge of a dagger twirling in her hands. She lets out a small whimper - she can’t help it - as the woman teases the decorative blade against a button on her coat, causing it to pop. The golden snake hilt seems to hiss up at her, but Belladonna doesn’t get another word out as Lukas instantly brushes up against her side, discreetly holding a knife against her waist, the sharp point brushing her clothing.

“You touch her and you die,” he growls, his accent coming out thicker than ever. 

“I won’t have to kill her,” she says, shrugging. “I’ve already gotten my payment, and besides, even if I did, no one would miss her otherwise.” Belladonna nods towards the security at the front. “Now, I said they wouldn’t listen to the bratva, but to foreign intelligence--”

A gunshot rings out throughout the hall, and Lila ducks away as Lukas tackles Belladonna to the ground, the men in arms now shouting in Russian throughout the foyer, waving at patrons to duck for cover. She throws herself behind a couch, swearing underneath her breath as she loads her gun, holding it with shaky hands.

_ No one would miss her otherwise-- _

_ “Let’s go!”  _ Lukas yells, delivering a swift kick to Belladonna’s temple. The agent swiftly falls to the ground as he runs towards her, but the British woman doesn’t stay down for long, already having snatched her serpentine blade off the ground. Lila doesn’t get to object as he practically carries her into his chest with one arm - then heaves her over one shoulder like she weighs nothing but a sack of potatoes.

_ “Lukas!” _ she shrieks as the sounds of gunfire follow, as he dashes into a hallway shooting at the glass doors to allot them an escape. He doesn’t respond as she kicks at his chest, bangs her fist on his back frantically.  _ “Lukas, I swear to god if you don’t put me down--!” _

“It’s easier to carry you this way!” he exclaims, and she swears she can hear the edge of a grin in his voice. He is having fun. He is having  _ fun,  _ this  _ infuriating man. _

_ “I am not a sack of potatoes!” _

_ “You weigh just as much!” _

“You--”

She doesn’t get a chance to say anymore as he wraps both arms around her waist and leaps out the door, running like a madman out into the street. 

____

He puts her down near a mattress shop on Okhotny Ryad, and by then, both of them are too exhausted and flushed to even care about what either of them do next: Lila whipping off her wig, shrugging out her curls, and Lukas kicking open the door and shooting the alarm of the still-darkened shop.

“They’re gonna sue you for damages,” she pants.

“I’m a police officer under federal law,” he rasps, offering his hand. “In.” When she doesn’t follow immediately, he waves again. “They’ll find the safehouse if we go back instantly, and we need somewhere to hide.”

“You were the one that took me over your shoulder and ran out there when we could’ve done something!” she cries out suddenly, and his eyes widen, as if he wasn’t expecting her to be upset. “She betrayed us. She betrayed us, and we could’ve gotten information out of her.”

“This is not your speciality, Lila,” Lukas warns, suddenly somber. “I had to get you out of there.”

“Why? Why, because you think I couldn’t have interrogated her?”

“You said you specialized in intelligence collection that wasn’t physical.”

“I  _ do!”  _ she shrieks, furiously commanding herself not to cry.  _ Don’t you dare. Don’t you dare act weak.  _ “I do. And I could’ve tried even though I didn’t know how, but even you didn’t trust me to handle the situation. Handle myself!” 

“Lila.” He’s saying her name like that again, and she hates it. “Lila, please.”

“Enough.” She wipes at the corners of her eyes, hiding her face from Lukas. “Let’s just lay low for the night. I won’t bother you.”

Before she can walk off, Lukas snatches the hood of her coat, turning her around to face him. The shadows that usually cover his face are gone, his stoic expression now oddly soft. He is still fierce, but there is a grace, now, in his lips, and a sorrow in his eyes she cannot decipher as he looks at her. Looks straight at her, almost aware of how he must seem like a towering beast over a rabbit.

“That.” He huffs in exasperation. “That is what I do not like about you, Lila Desroses.”

“What is?!” she demands.

“The fact that you want to do too much for everyone. And then shove aside your own needs. Even I can tell you are too kind-hearted in all the wrong ways, not the ways that matter - at least, in the field.”

“Having a kind heart is already a weakness,” she snaps.

“No, it’s not.” His lips thin into a taut line. “No, it’s not. You are….resilient.”

Lila snorts. “Frankly, the CIA wants someone more like you.”

He glances away from a brief second. “I trusted you. I just did not want you to get hurt. You may have been assigned to me, but I am assigned to you in that regard as well.” Lukas pauses briefly, then offers out his hand. She looks down as well. “I make a vow to you here and now. I won’t betray you or double-cross you, even after we get out of this city. Understood?”

Lila only hesitates for a brief few seconds before taking his hand and shaking firmly.

“Understood.”

They part after that, standing awkwardly until she moves into the dark shop first, searching for a halfway decent mattress to rest on. 

“You said the CIA wanted someone like me,” he says after a while. She’s testing out a large bed, enough for both of them to sit on. Silently, he perches next to her, hands clasped together. “Undoubtedly it’s due to my past. Why did they hire...you?”

“For their secretarial work,” Lila responds evenly, stretching out her legs. “Initially. I managed to secure a spot as an entry-level agent after overhearing a conversation I wasn’t supposed to hear down in West Soho. Former Italian Republic member conversing with one of our own. The rest is history. Although,” she continues, “I’m one step away from losing it all.”

“Because of this mission.” Lukas looks at her then.

“I mean, if I fail, it’s expected, right?” she mutters. “Lila’s the weakest one. They fire me if I don’t get you out of here. Convenient subtraction if I lose.”

He grits his teeth. “They should not consider you weak.”

“They do anyway.” She flops onto the bed, taking out her contacts. Thankfully, her spectacles are still in the pocket of her coat. “Come on.”

Lukas follows her without a word, both of them facing the opposite direction as they share the one bed she’s deemed soft enough to warrant a night’s rest. It doesn’t take long for her to drift off, uncomfortable as she may be, his presence a steady pulse at her side, and when she wakes before the sun rises, she finds that they’ve somehow rotated over in their sleep and drawn closer, their hands barely intertwined - their index fingers interlocked, the warmth seeping between them a miniature rhythm of a heart.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Literally none of you saw this coming. I know, I know. But I was tired of writing two idiots over and over again for once, and lo and behold, decided to switch to writing the most underrated couple to ever exist in the PH-verse. Russians I apologize if I have butchered literally ANYTHING. Anyhow, stan the true queen and king of this webcomic, who deserve the world and like, the universe. LULA CANON KING.
> 
> This’ll be a two parter, as you can tell. I am, uh...very enthusiastic about part two. Lots more snow, food, mayhaps a certain POV from two certain couples, hotdog carts, and forehead kisses. Let’s go.


	2. the fire and the frost

In the evening, after they make it back to the safe house and get their affairs in order, Lila proposes a walk in the local Neskuchny Garden. It is almost another two days, and she needs information to give Hermann that isn’t a report of all her failures. 

Lukas agrees to be interviewed without question. He can’t resist her for long. It’s impossible. He’d tried, really, but he can’t deny her anything, it seems. 

The park is a relatively flat piece of land, one of the few areas within the wintry city where life is allowed to thrive. Ducks huddle in bunches over the lakes in the summer, bodegas sheltering passerby as they take their picnics. Apparently, a former Emperor took residence here, from what he can remember, the remains of a palace in the distance. But even that grandeur has to give way to the lady of winter, as she scatters her barren snow over everything and everyone. That hasn’t stopped life from thriving in the bleak midwinter, however - smoky food stalls are at every corner, carriages trodding through slush with horses neighing at the fray. She walks next to him on one of the narrow paths, lit up by daylight. The combination of the bright sun and the snow is nearly blinding, giving off the false impression of warmth when it is anything but. He’s in his usual turtlenecks and coats, but somehow, Lila has managed to draw a capsule wardrobe from her own belongings that shoots out a new outfit everyday. 

Today’s, apparently, is a broad teal hat and beige trench, with an umbrella tucked under one arm. Elbow-length leather gloves and heeled boots give her an aura of mystery - given and all, he supposes, due to her agent status. Her glasses keep fogging up though, and Lukas has to restrain himself from giving her the handkerchief he keeps in his pocket every five seconds.

“I doubt we want to stop anywhere,” she says suddenly, after several moments of silence. A carriage passes them, wheels scraping over ice.

“That would be none the wiser,” he gruffly agrees.

“Agreed,” Lila stammers, looking away. Lukas fervently wishes she’d stop doing that. It isn’t as if he’s going to kill her on sight.

Then again, he _does_ have his - well - reputation.

“What--” Lukas breaks off, looking down. Somehow, the American wants to make him say more than he’s said in weeks, which is usually next to nothing if possible. “What was in the file they gave you on me?”

“The information I needed to track you down, at most,” she confesses. “When you started leaking information - two years prior, before the start of the nuclear arms war between our countries. Back when the trials were still going on. When the bratva was still active.” Lila swallows nervously before continuing. “I won’t go on if you don’t want me to.”

“You must. You came here for answers, after all.”

“I guess I did,” she says, crossing her arms. They keep walking, although her pace has slowed, and he matches her strides - short, calculated things with his long ones. “But there’s one thing I want to know about.”

“Which is?”

“Belladonna mentioned something about tattoos.”

He freezes. The memories hit him as soon as they come - a knocking on his door, a revelation, the snow coming in. Always the snow, that slowly-melting maiden. And then the KGB’s offer: protection, a weapon, against fear.

“You shouldn’t be asking me these things.”

“I’m asking them anyway,” Lila says softly, caramel hair drifting in the wind. In cashmere and wool, she looks the portrait of benevolence as she always does; and frankly, always is. But there is more, if one dares to look - beyond the rose-tinted glitter of her eyeshadow, the fog crystallizing on her spectacles, the bridge of her straight nose, the look in her eyes. The look in her eyes Lukas is more familiar with than he’d like to be. 

_No one thinks I can be anything other than what I look like._

“Go ahead and ask them,” he says gruffly, voice low and heady like the scratch of a gold tipped needle about to play a melody on some forlorn phonograph. “It’s your job anyhow, solnyshka.”

She blinks, struck by the word. She hadn’t reacted to the nicknames he’d used for her in public to veil the fact that both of them were spies - milaya, _sweet girl._ Solnyshka, _little sun._

How ironic of him to be drawn to something so warm when he is not supposed to melt.

“Did you join--”

“For a while, yes,” he confesses. “It seemed like a duty at first. And I’d be lying if I didn’t like the power that came with it.” Lukas sucks in a breath, a mirthless grin playing on his shadowy visage. “My father was already connected to the bratva. I was merely playing apprentice. It was nice, admittedly, as a misguided boy, to see the fear in others’ eyes.”

He waits for her to judge. Too often, people do. Lila doesn’t.

She doesn’t, and instead goes onto the next question. “You served a prison sentence before being inducted into the KGB.”

“I did. Six months.”

“What made them collect you?”

“My skills. Interestingly enough, I overheard things I shouldn’t have overheard.” He glances down at her. “We have that much in common. Little time for a punishment ink.”

She nods curtly. “I see.”

Lila almost collides headfirst into a line of people until he holds her back with one arm. Apparently, they’d been too distracted walking to see a throng of people lined up for fresh ponchiki - a treat, undoubtedly, in cold weather. He can smell sugar and fresh frying dough from this distance, intoxicating. When he looks back at her, there’s an almost adorable sparkle in her eyes as she takes in the sights of the cart, hazel eyes wide with splinters of gold glittering in the light. 

He doesn’t even hesitate to slide into the line, even as she makes a noise of protest.

“We’ll continue our walk,” he reassures her. “Coming?”

With no shortage of reluctance, she accepts his outstretched hand. He pulls her in gently, their shoulders bumping. It takes a while for them to get in the front, but when they do, he orders two seperate packets of mini ponchiki, the donuts still warm as they pass into their hands in paper bags. Lukas barely quells a laugh as she pops one in her mouth - and immediately starts tearing up.

“You should’ve waited,” he teases, voice laced with mirth.

“I see that now - _gosh,”_ she splutters, coughing.

Lukas smiles down at her, watching as she courageously blinks back tears. “Never lose your spirit, solnyshka.”

“Wasn’t planning on it.”

“That’s my girl.”

  
  


_____

  
  


**elsewhere**

  
  


The brownstone bell has rung for the third time, and Lauren is still panicking.

_“In a minute!”_ she yells, furiously fiddling with her ponytail. Her hair is askew, and she furiously combs it back until it resembles something neat, then proceeds to smooth down her dress, the long skirt pooling over her legs. A vest covers her upper body, sleeveless, thin gold chain dripping opals draping over her elegant neck. She’s never dressed this fancily for a date, but somehow, this one seems fitting. 

And besides, it’s easier to store the two guns, five knives, and garrote wire she keeps handy on her person with a longer dress. 

The doorbell barely rings once more before she yanks it open, her mouth immediately parting into what she desperately hopes is a winning smile. Although at the sight of _him,_ it immediately becomes a real one. The sun frames him in colors she hasn’t seen for months in the winter: turquoise meeting her gold, hair the color of the precise down feathers of ravens, artful brown and gray and hints of emerald plaid in his scarf and coat. Kieran gives her a once-over, mouth quirking up into a smirk.

“You didn’t think I was an intruder again, now, did you?”

“‘Course not,” she lies.

“Liar.”

“Whatever,” she chirps, too giddy with the sight of him to retaliate, choosing to instead silence him with a kiss.

They had met, as all fateful lovers do, through accident.

Although a bullet wound was a bit more of an accident than she’d bargained for.

She hadn’t _meant_ to shoot him, per se. It’s just that two months ago she’d been jumpy and exhausted from her flight back from Shanghai, her silencer taut in her hands and a whirlwind of memories occupying her mind. The revelation that her parents had backed weapons operations during the former war. The fact that old ghosts were still chasing her around wherever she went. She came to the CIA to protect, to lay down a new legacy - just didn’t expect that a new legacy meant that bodies would still drop like flies around her. It had begun to eat away at her mind, the darkness of it all.

So when she’d accidentally come into the wrong apartment in her building and come face to face with a man with paint stains on his apron and a disheveled bun that somehow made him look cute despite the mess, she’d done the same thing she usually did - shot first, asked questions later. That turned out to be a big problem after Lauren had to call for medical help as he clutched at his leg.

Somehow, Kieran White did not sue her.

Instead, he asked her out on a date, which turned out to be half an interrogation session - apparently he had identified her gun, and known exactly who she was, because of his former background as an unwilling bounty hunter. That had been the final straw for the puzzle pieces to click into place. He’d run to New York to remake his life, she was in the process of starting.

And so the first date became a second, and a third, and soon twenty were under her belt and news had gotten out.

(She suspects it was Kym to this day. Near Bethesda Fountain just so happened to be a very poorly dressed old lady hiding behind a newspaper with shockingly blue hair and a cheek mole. Kym still denies it.)

“You haven’t told me where we’re going, _mon bien-aimee,"_ he teases, turning a lock of auburn in his fingers as they pull apart, still clinging onto each other. “Should I be expecting surprises more often?”

“Don’t get ahead of yourself,” she says, snorting as she tugs at his scarf. “You know how you kept saying you wanted to visit one of this city’s more famous art museums without all the tourists around?”

“Which is literally impossible all 365 days of the year?”

“Not anymore.” She beams at him as a hotdog cart rolls past them, umbrella shaking in the wind. Kieran’s eyes widen as she holds up two tickets in her hand. “All-access tickets to the MET. Private tour. No one else. Just you and me.”

Her boyfriend blinks once, then twice.

“Lauren?”

“Yes?” 

“You said it was a private tour,” he repeats, an amused and nervous tone slipping into his voice. “Private tours occur even when there are people around.”

“It took a bit of bribery on my uncle’s front,” she admits sheepishly.

“Look into my eyes,” Kieran says sternly, “and tell me you did not buy out the entire MET.”

She looks away.

_“Lauren.”_

“Surprise?” she says, waving her arms, as he groans into his hand. “It’s only for a day - you shouldn’t be concerned about the cost,” she continues, as he starts walking towards her, one hand in his pockets. She doesn’t see the miniature velvet box he clutches. “It’s all covered--”

“Marry me,” he says, sweeping her off her feet as she squeals, right in front of two pressed-together cars and a hotdog cart.

____

“And that’s Ladell 5, Hawkes 2,” Kym quips, tossing a sesame noodle in his face. It sticks. Will bats it fast enough to warrant a new record for their little game, and sends an egg roll flying at her face. She catches it with ease, snickering as he wipes off sauce with a napkin, glaring at her all the while. “You could comment on your usual drivel about me acting like a kid, but guess who just shot an egg roll at me?”

“You--” He pinches the bridge of his nose. _“Fine.”_

Another low groan from him, and she only laughs harder. 

“Going to miss my company?”

“Fat chance,” Will says, rolling his eyes as they sit across from each other in the breakroom. “D.C’s in a couple of months, and by then, I won’t have to worry about flying egg rolls.”

She falls silent abruptly. An awkward pause falls between the two of them, and her bravado clearly falters. The problem is that forming a love-hate relationship with your frenemy in the workplace is that from day one onwards you’re not quite sure if they actually mean what they say or not. And that’s been the tale of Kym Ladell and William Hawkes for years - jabs, sudden touches disguised as accidents, affections disguised as teasing jokes. They dislike each other; Lauren’s the third party - which is saying something given how feral the woman is in combat - and there’s nothing more to it.

There’s _nothing more to it._

“I mean,” he starts up again, coughing into his palm as she whirls around to stare at him, “I won’t leave immediately.”

“Right.”

“And I’ll be back.”

“Right.”

“And you could call if anything...came up. If you needed anything.”

“I will.”

“Great,” he musters, looking skyward. She drops her face, quelling the heat rising to her cheeks. 

Now it’s Kym’s turn to break the ice. “Do you think Lila’s doing okay?”

“She can handle herself. Don’t worry,” Will adds on, his expression softening as he sees the genuine concern on her face. “It may be her first real mission, but she’s a quick study. I helped her during firearms training, too, and she’s a natural. Randall can be trusted. Nothing’s going to happen to them.”

“I just worry,” she says, exhaling. “It just - for all the tension between our two countries,” she begins, “she’s always been kind. Not that there’s anything wrong with it. Just out of place for a war, however senseless it might be.”

“I don’t think there’s anything wrong with that, really,” Will says after a while, considering this.

“Do you?”

“For one, isn’t compassion hard enough to come by as is?” he comments, arching a brow. 

Kym makes a noise of agreement, lips twitching up a bit as she looks back at him. “Coming from the same person who lives as the bane of my existence?”

_“Ladell.”_

_“Hawkes,”_ she shoots back, her grin going from cocky to a rarely-seen softer one. “Don’t be a stranger. Come back soon.”

“I might not.”

“You’d better, and that’s an order from your fellow agent,” she demands, planting her hands on the table. “Got it?”

“Got it,” he replies, and long before she knows it, the two of them are smiling at each other.

____

The knocking on Lukas’s door is something he recognizes, she realizes, with a bone-chilling sense of dread. Lila can see it in the way his head picks up like a cat’s, alert at the sound of a bell, in the way his frown gradually forms into a scowl and his hand goes to his belt on instinct. She doesn’t hold him back - she doesn’t want to; clearly this is something she has no business interfering on - and instead watches him cross over to the threshold of the safehouse.

It’s barely 3 in the morning, the night sky hardly giving way to any light in the sky. The streetlamps outside are a bright gold, almost blinding to her bare eyes, and she rubs at her face, her hazel hair falling in waves around her chin. Faint murmuring in Russian comes through, low enough she can’t make out enough of it, but the two tones are drastically different. One voice is rough, low, middle-aged. Clearly upset with whatever Lukas has done, and before she knows it, he’s snapping out a goodbye, and locking the door shut. She doesn’t expect him to swing open the door to the kitchen and come face to face with her. Without her spectacles, he’s a blurry figure swimming in her vision, but visible enough for her to spot taut anger in his features. His outfit is a disheveled red tracksuit, contrasting starkly with the seriousness on his visage.The scene would be comical if not for his expression screaming mass murder. But one blink, and the madness in his face is gone.

“I woke you?”

“I couldn’t sleep, anyways,” she says, looking sideways as she adjusts her glasses, putting them on quickly. 

His lips thin into a frown. “Did Hermann contact you?”

“He’s about to,” she confesses. “I’m not quite sure when he does, but it’s never at regular times, and--”

As if on cue, the phone rings. She swallows, turning around in fear. Lukas makes a motion almost as if to grab her shoulder out of the corner of her eye, but she’s pacing towards the phone on the wall too fast for him to react. Lila inhales sharply, anxiety pricking the nerves in her body, gooseflesh rising to meet the cold air as she picks up, waiting for a voice to speak on the other side of the line. 

“It’s me,” she whispers, even though Lukas can hear anyhow.

Hermann’s voice comes through strained and stern as usual. “Agent Desroses. Is the client with you? The week is nearly over.”

“He’s safe and sound with me. I apologize for the former incident.”

“An amateur mistake is what you made, Lila,” he snaps, and she winces visibly. “Davenport was clearly armed to the teeth, and several police weren’t even able to track her down later. You shouldn’t have lost her trail.”

“I was assigned to track down Randall--”

“--and from what you’ve told me, it seems more like he’s been tracking _you_ down,” her superior barks. “Desroses. You’ve hardly gathered any information on him. Is there anything else I should know, or it is just useless garbage?”

Lila wills her fists to unclench, anger hot and heavy in her throat. She blinks away the beginnings of tears, pricking at her eyes harder than glass shards do stuck to skin. “His former mafia background is brief. Never served a sentence longer than 6 months, hasn’t had any experience with other criminal organizations. If this is a measure of his trustworthiness--”

“It is and it isn’t.” Hermann makes a low noise of disgruntledness. “You’ll both be headed back to New York soon. Don’t manage to get killed in that period, Agent.”

Before she can reply, he’s hung up. 

When she sets the phone back on the wall, turning around slowly so that Lukas doesn’t see the redness in her eyes, she’s shocked at the sudden appearance of his fury. Shadows have creeped over his face, bangs darkening the already-blacked visage of his brow. His mouth is taut, carved into a scowl. 

“Your superior sounds--” He breaks off, clearly too frustrated to talk. Lila, oddly, feels as if she’s slipped into a hot tub of warm water when he switches over to Russian. _“Zasranec._ I’d hate for him to have more bark than his bite.”

“Are you threatening my boss who’s halfway across the world?” Lila asks, the language now sounding gentler on her tongue, for some reason. When she talks with him, the syllables sound less smoothed-over and more like a cadence compared to the low, gravelly tones of his voice. They’re opposites; they match. “Don’t pull out your gun just yet.”

“Oh, I’d love to,” he retorts, grinning darkly. “But then he’d deem me a traitor and shipped off.”

“I don’t think that’d be the best course of action,” she says, and despite everything, laughs. His scowl fades a bit at the warmth on her face, and whether or not it’s unintentional, both of them de-tense. 

“Could--” When she speaks again, she still hesitates, but doesn’t stop her words from coming out in a fluid stream like before. “Who was that, at the door?”

“Someone you don’t want to know,” Lukas says bitterly, looking towards the entrance. “Since you’re going to pierce it together yourself - yes, I see the cogs turning in your head, Lila - it was my former boss. He and the other members of the bratva deemed me _suka_ after my refusal to participate in the draft and when I served my sentence long afterwards. They are not just threatening me. They are threatening you.”

She clutches onto the edge of the dinner table, sucking in a harsh breath. “Why?”

“Because I have long broken off contact with my family for their safety.” He looks at her almost tenderly as he says his next few words. “And you are the only weakness they see I have left.”

“I’m your weakness,” she breathes, hardly daring to move as he comes closer. His scent brushes against her own; soap and something smoky. Lukas’s lashes are long, pattering against his cheeks as stardust frames both of them in the dark light.

“I meant what I said to Belladonna.”

“Well, I mean what I’m about to say then, too,” she says stubbornly, balancing on the tips of her feet. Lila’s become aware of her body’s reaction to him being closer, almost flushing at its automatic response: to reach up, to the point where their heads are in a straight diagonal line downwards, poised in time. He’s close enough to kiss. “I won’t let anything touch you. I mean it. We made a deal, didn’t we?”

He smiles. It doesn’t look ill-fitting on him - instead, it looks natural, even, suiting the darkness of his features. It nearly rips the breath out of her. “We did.”

She holds her hand out, tentatively. It doesn’t shake, and yet, it feels as if she’s touched lightning for the first time when he clasps his palm over hers, larger than life, big enough to encircle her whole tiny wrist in his grip. The edge of his shirt has risen up a bit, and she tears her eyes away from the golden strip of skin showing just above his navel.

“Lukas.”

“Lila.”

“I trust you.”

“As do I, my sun.” His gaze softens. “You’re going to want to hear this next part.”

____

His old comrades will be meeting at the Grand Kremlin Palace, under false identities and under invitation they have no doubt forged - to a government luncheon, which he and Lila will be attending courtesy of the KGB. She isn’t enthusiastic about this; he can tell, but she certainly doesn’t seem reluctant, either. Instead, she seems determined. Nods to the event with shining eyes beneath those cat’s-eye glasses: black-tie, five hours, with weapons and most likely a confrontation involved sooner or later, and gets to work, flitting off into the sunset like an energized bird. Comes back with a wrapped package smelling of roses and asks him about his weapons stock.

He’s never given her anything sooner.

The two guns rest like gifts in her hands. Polished and with a gold shine on the handlebars. Rather gaudy, but it’s the function she needs, not the look.

They’ve agreed to arrive at seperate times, separately, so they won’t be seen together by any of his colleagues. He doesn’t steal a car this time to get to the palace - instead, a very nice limo ordered by people he does not want to think about - arrives at his front door, and in he goes, first in line, to arrive. An escort for all the guests guides him near St. Alexander Nevsky Hall, and that’s when his mood goes from disgruntled to plain old _sour._

Even an entire carton of whisky in his coffee will not save this.

The hall is enormous, and looks like it’s been whisked out of a fairytale. Which is the problem. If he has to deal with any more opulence and any more tittering from the local guests who have started to take notice of the gentlemen entering the ballroom, he is going to start shooting. The official name of the hall is the Hall of the Order of St. Alexander Nevsky, and what a ballroom it is, indeed. Tall, arching ceilings in flawless white marble, gold in swirls and geometric designs spiraling around the dome above his head, with windows in shrouds of red velvet on either side of him. Exit doors on either side, the darkness below, with the wooden floors cleaned to a high shine. 

It makes him want to vomit. 

And then the other shoe drops.

_“Lukasha.”_

It’s been ages since he’s heard anyone call him by a nickname, and he nearly does pull out his gun when a familiar face appears near him, grinning with all teeth. The rancid scent of cheap cologne only serves to cut his already-severe appearance into multiples. His blonde hair is slicked back, and his double-breasted suit is in both black and white - this is technically a formal black-tie event, after all.

So he smiles tightly to make sure his old comrade has gotten the message. “Sasha.”

Aleksander scowls. “Really, Lukas? This is how you treat an old friend?”

“I don’t need friends. They disappoint me.”

He laughs loudly, accepting a flute of champagne from a nearby waiter. “Well, if you insist. That’s actually quite true, given how many enemies you have.” Aleksander snaps his fingers. “In fact, consider me an ally for the time being. Infighting between Ivan’s territories has gotten to be quite nasty. Inna and Koloda have been struggling for hold over your old duties. You shouldn’t have left. It’s a mess.”

“That is precisely _why_ I left,” he says, scowling even deeper. Lila is still nowhere to be seen, and a migraine is starting to take hold. 

“And for the police? Really?” The other man laughs. “It’s like you want everyone out for your head.”

“Oh, Sasha,” he says, smiling mirthlessly as he flashes a knife hilt hidden in the breast of his suit jacket, “you and I know I’m no stranger to violence.”

Aleksander’s smile doesn’t fade. “No, you’re not.”

“Well? Is Ivan going to make good on his threat or--?”

“Careful where you stick your nose.” Lukas flinches back from Aleksander as he leans in to whisper in his ear. “By St. George Hall in an hour, tops. We don’t want a scene here.”

“Right.” He snorts. “Because the bratva is _so_ conducted and elegant that it doesn’t want a scene.”

“Can’t argue with that, friend,” Aleksander says, clapping Lukas on the shoulder as he leaves, clearly anticipating the hiss of breath it draws, along with the sound of a hand on a gun holster. “See you!”

The only reason he doesn’t follow Aleksander out and track down his old mafia family is because of the next person who enters the hall. 

And as soon as she does, Lukas’s vision tunnels.

____

He’s in black.

In a turtleneck, but it’s what he always wears. Crimson-colored underneath a lovely coal colored suit, with a thin silver chain over his neck and rings on his fingers, glittering with subtle gemstones. She realizes only then that she matches him, adjusting her glasses on the bridge of her nose: the sleeveless gown she wears tumbles down the ground in a spiral of silk and chiffon, layered like a flower, embroidered at the waist with white roses, matching her opera gloves. Her hair has been coiffed, a slight variation in her usual style, and diamond earrings dangle from either lobe.

They fit.

They _fit._

Lila makes her way over to him nervously, clasping her hands together. When she approaches, he looks as if he’s been run over by a train, even though every single inch of him is put-together.

“Hello.”

_Nicely done, moron._

“Lila,” he says in response, holding out his hand. “You look beautiful.”

She flushes as she takes it. “Thank you.”

“I mean it.”

“I know you do.” _Are you serious?!_ “I mean--”

“I know what you mean.” He nods down at her, smiling a bit. “Shall we?”

The first dance of the night is in mere seconds, and so they lead each other down to the main floor. She recognizes the tune, a simple enough box waltz, but doesn’t expect the feel of Lukas’s hands brushing over her bare back. The dress has a low-cut bodice, her skin practically exposed in the back, so she should’ve anticipated it - but doesn’t, and is once again left stunned in his grip. His hand nearly closes entirely over her own, the other lifting her other up. 

A silent question: _are you okay?_

She nods, twice. The guns press against her legs as she begins to move. 

She can do this.

Lukas twirls her in a slow spin around the room as the other dancers begin to move, gold spinning around in a flutter as she looks skyward, then back at him. He’s always been incredibly tall, but in this context, seems to almost shield her delicate frame away from everyone else, keeping her for his own. His. 

“I spotted you talking to someone,” she whispers in English.

His mouth twitches down a bit, but he answers. “One of my old comrades. It’s a good thing we made the decision to arrive at different times.”

“Got it,” she murmurs, looking sideways as they adjust their position to match the tempo of the song. But Lukas’s frown doesn’t fade, and when she won’t meet his eyes, he captures her chin to turn her face his way. His eyes are all black, boring into hers. She can’t look away. 

“There is something you’re not telling me,” he says softly. “Lila.”

She swallows harshly. “They will harm you.”

“They won’t,” he says sternly. “We’ve made plans--”

“To hell with them,” she bursts out, and he reels back in surprise. “I was sent to extract you safely. _I_ cannot risk your danger. _I_ cannot risk something happening to you.”

“Lila--”

_“Lukas.”_

“No. You don’t get it, do you?” he asks, and when he next twirls her, he catches her waist, pulling her flush against him as the song ends. “Do you understand _you_ were the entire reason I agreed to be extracted? That was the only reason why I made a vow. To keep you safe,” he snarls. “Lila Desroses, you are not allowed to shove yourself into battle for the sake of others. You are not allowed to throw yourself into danger just because of others. I will not let you be a _convenient subtraction.”_

Her breath is ripped from her, clean out of her throat.

And as soon as it is, that’s when the gunshots begin.

Lukas is the one who leaps in front of her, shoving her to the ground behind a table. They land in a leap of silk, her skirt like scattered black petals as they hold onto each other for dear life. She scans the area - three men in the front, armed with silencers - and Lukas over her, with a gun already in his hands.

“Trap.”

“I’m aware!” he yells over the din. “So much for a scene, _Sasha--”_

“Lukas--!” she yells, but he’s already retreating, his warmth leaving her. She grabs for his wrist, and he hesitates for only a second. 

“Get out while you can,” he says softly. “And whatever happens _\- stay safe.”_

_“Lukas!”_

It’s no use.

He’s already gone in without her, entering the fray with nothing but the promise of a fight.

____

In truth, she should’ve listened to him.

Lukas’s former bratva members were ruthless. More were shot down than she cared to see. But he didn’t stop shooting, not until at least one went down in a spray of crimson, the entire ballroom decked in shades of violence. It was all going down smoothly until one man in white decided to land a hit on her partner, and had the man crashing into one of the windows.

That, in hindsight, was the thing to make her snap.

But somehow, raising the trigger to aim didn’t feel wrong this time.

_You are not a convenient subtraction._

She wasn’t.

Her sweetness was not meant to mollify. Her kindness was not to be used. Her ferocity was not absurd.

She was _Lila Desroses_ , and she was _not what others made her to be._

So she shot.

____

_“Solnyshka!”_ he shouts, loud above the din. Even louder: _“Lila!”_

The gunshot had come from her, but she didn’t register it until she dropped the gun and Lukas’s attacker fell to the ground - injured, not fatally wounded. Lukas’s suit was stained, and a bruise covered his jaw, but he came rushing towards her as if he wasn’t injured at all. She blinks through the pain as he cups her face, searching her face for any marks, any bruises - and there are none, because he’s already knocked several of her would-be-attackers unconscious by fist - or shot them dead by his gun. “Are you alright?”

Lila realizes, then. He’d put knives and bullets and countless weapons on his person just for her. He’d risked death more than a thousand times just for her. He’d do anything if she asked, and somehow, she does not fear a bit of it. 

“I’m okay,” she breathes, gripping onto his shoulders. “I’m okay—”

Lukas notices it before she does; her vision is still blurry. He comes into focus when he slides on her glasses - one lens broken, but the spectacles are intact enough for her to see just what lies in front of her: Lukas looking down at her as if she is the sun and all the stars in the world, an incredulous fondness in his eyes she’s never seen before. It knocks the breath out of her. He moves back his hands, fingers brushing her cheek, and her eyes flutter half-shut at the motion.

“Better?” he asks, voice slightly hoarse. 

“Better,” she replies. 

“Thank goodness,” he says lowly, and before she can react, swiftly pulls her into his arms, lips brushing the top of her head. She closes her eyes, gripping onto the collar of his shirt as he holds her tight, warmth everywhere on her skin, down to her bones, seeping into her heart. 

She is home, at last.

And so is he.

____

**long after**

“I bet _twenty--”_

“No, you bet a hundred,” quips Kym, flicking her open palm Will’s way. “Pay up.”

“Can you please not open up my friend’s wallet today?” Lauren teases, sighing as she watches her two friends bicker in front of her about bets. Lila giggles at the commotion around them: the entire CIA gathered around Lauren’s station once again, drunk as anything, party streamers lining the floor. The only difference - well, a big one - is that two new guests happen to be here, and the redhead herself dons a diamond ring on her fourth finger.

It matches with Kieran’s own ring as he loops an arm around his fiancee’s, watching the debacle go down between the two agents. He seems amused by the entire situation, sharing the same exasperated glance Lauren does.

“So Kym was betting on the engagement in two weeks?” he asks, cocking a brow Lauren’s way. “Wonder what that says about-- _ow.”_

He breaks off as she flicks the side of his forehead, almost looking grumpier than a certain person she knows. “Will was closer to the original timeline, anyhow. Three months, Kym. You should be paying _him.”_

“I had two,” Lila pipes up. 

“Then all payments go her way,” Kieran says, bowing a bit, and she laughs again. 

“Oh, and before I forget,” Lauren says suddenly, rushing over to her bag, the flush on her face almost matching her hair, “I got you something - _here,”_ she says in a rush, handing Kieran a wrapped present, about the size of a picture frame. “Artbook. On Da Vinci,” she says. The problem is that it comes out _Da-Vinki._

He blinks. Once. Twice. “What?”

Lauren repeats what she said.

Barely ten seconds pass before Kieran mutters something along the lines of “you’re so damn stupid,” and that’s when Lila has to avert her eyes as the couple practically start eating each other’s faces.

The distraction is a welcome one, anyhow, as she walks over to the balcony for fresh air. Springtime brings home the scent of fresh peat and flower blossoms, so unlike New York’s winters - or Moscow’s. When she’d returned home with Lukas in hand, she’d kept her promise: one, to not hand Lukas over to Hermann’s custody, despite her director nearly throwing a fit, and two, to herself, applied for a higher position. 

It was Kym who had been the loudest supporter of Lila’s new career track, snarling at anyone who dare doubted the former secretary could handle such a thing. Despite her numerous jokes on Lila bringing home the literal definition of death. If death was Russian, perhaps. Her own little _Morozoko,_ the Frost king himself.

Her red dress whistles in the wind as she tips her head up to the stars, breathing in the night air. It’s been months, but she still startles as a presence approaches behind her silently.

Lila jumps. “Someone—”

“Ought to put a bell on me?” quips Lukas, wrapping his arms around her waist. “It’s only me, Lila.”

“I’m aware.” She grins up at him, a retort already on her tongue. “Kotenok.”

_Kitten._

He flushes at that, and she bursts into giggles. If it were anyone else calling him a cat, he’d probably have them murdered - but with her, he is so unexpectedly tender, and so are his kisses: sweet and all at once, tinged with stardust. She has to lift herself on her tiptoes to wrap her arms around his shoulders, pulling him closer, and when they part, sharing the same breath, they’re both smiling.

“Home?”

“Home,” he agrees, her hand in his. “In my own car this time, I assure you.”

“I expected nothing less,” she teases, and follows him all the way down.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *pops bottle* AND WE'RE HERE BABY!!!
> 
> I never expected to fall so hard for Lula in the year of our lord 2021, but...alas, here we are, with our ponchiki and vodka. (Don't mix those two together). As you can probably tell, Luna’s regularly scheduled programming, aka 100% Sap Mode, is back on. You all make me very, very happy, lovelies. I hope you have enjoyed reading about these two chaotic babies as much as I have, less chaotic as they are compared to the main four. 
> 
> Seeing you sooner than you think,  
> Luna <3


End file.
